lyndon taylor wrote:We have no problem Ben, we're both coffee drinkers, the point I was trying to make is alot of people are much more sensitive to stimulants than we may be, for them to drink as much coffee as you or I, might be about the stimulant effect of you or I snorting a short line of speed, so I hope you can understand why I would not want to recommend coffee drinking to those folks so sensitive to it.

This is in no way any encouragement of people to snort speed!! Or to drink coffee for that matter if you don't want to!!

Hi Lyndon,Its ok - I do understand where you are coming from.

Hi Dagon,

I think part of the problem here is that we all consider depression and associated conditions from our own personal experiences (as an individual or carer of someone with depression). In reality it can be a disease in itself or a symptom of another disease; its cause are wide and varied as is the way that it is experienced by the individual (and those close to them). Logically, the appropriate treatments also vary so generalizations come with a risk.

I am not suggesting that there is a 'one size fits all' approach. As I have mentioned several times - I think the research is interesting and if there is a place for 'coffee therapy' it would be amongst a number of measures and possibly as a preventative lifestyle option.

Hi Lyndon,

Strong coffee drinkers are a segment of the population that is probably less sensitive to drugs than average, for instance it takes a lot of coffee to effect their sleep, if it ever does, it probably takes a lot of alcohol to get them drunk, probably takes them higher doses of street drugs to get off. Well guess what, suicidal ideations are usually caused by excesses of brain neuro transmitter chemicals, what if these same insensitive to caffeine people are less sensitive to the effects of the brains neuro transmitter drugs that lead to suicidal psychosis or depression, hence less likely to become crazy enough to consider suicide.

I disagree with your assessment of the Huffington Post. It is a good newspaper. And all they are doing in this instance is reporting the major findings of the published research. Rather than base your theory on what has been reported in the Huffington Post - I recommend you track down the original article which will, I am sure, fill in some of the blanks.kind regards,

Ben

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725

---The trouble is that you think you have time------Worry is the Interest, paid in advance, on a debt you may never owe------It's not what happens to you in life that is important ~ it's what you do with it ---

once again, Ben, I'm also a fan of the Huffington post, just not this article, any scientific study of this sort would mention the distinct possibility that the coffee drinking might be just coincidental to the lower suicide rate, as opposed to actually causing the lower suicide rate. Its kind of like a study that white people live on average longer than black people, does that mean being black causes you to have a shorter life, does it mean white people have better genes, or does it simply mean, because of society, black people tend to be poorer and have less access to expensive medical care.

When you do a scientific study like this, it very rare for there to be only one possible explanation for the data, but the Huffinton post only presents one possible scenario, the coffee itself causes people to be less suicidal, rather than mention as I'm sure the actual science paper mentions, there is the opposite possibility that being less suicidal causes you to drink more coffee, or makes you more likely to have a higher tolerance for caffeine.

I'm going to try to bring up the actual science paper and see what it says, and possibly copy paste.

18 years ago I made one of the most important decisions of my life and entered a local Cambodian Buddhist Temple as a temple boy and, for only 3 weeks, an actual Therevada Buddhist monk. I am not a scholar, great meditator, or authority on Buddhism, but Buddhism is something I love from the Bottom of my heart. It has taught me sobriety, morality, peace, and very importantly that my suffering is optional, and doesn't have to run my life. I hope to give back what little I can to the Buddhist community that has so generously given me so much, sincerely former monk John

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725

Most people who try to commit suicide (successful or not) are those who have come to the end of their tether, see no hope for themselves and believe that those around them would be better off without them. It is either a last desperate act calling out for help or a desperate act to end it. Usually it is the end of a long road of deep and profound sadness; failed attempts to get help, a system that stigmatizes rather than support. Crazy is not a word i would use.

Ben , sorry i expressed my self badly we are total on the same page - i have seen first hand the effects you are talking about with a number of friends, family members and clients.

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725

Well guess what the real science article titled;Coffee, caffeine, and risk of completed suicide: Results from three prospective cohorts of American adults

costs $43 for a 24 hour pass to the journal, these guys aren't just trying to sell coffee, its funny in the Harvard Gazzette article linked to above by cooran, they claim to have evidence caffeine is an antidepressant increases levels of neurotransmitters that fight depression, but they're so convinced coffee causes lower suicide rates(sarcastic) that they recommend against starting drinking coffee if you don't already. so lets just leave it at that, but this whole thing looks a little bogus to me.

18 years ago I made one of the most important decisions of my life and entered a local Cambodian Buddhist Temple as a temple boy and, for only 3 weeks, an actual Therevada Buddhist monk. I am not a scholar, great meditator, or authority on Buddhism, but Buddhism is something I love from the Bottom of my heart. It has taught me sobriety, morality, peace, and very importantly that my suffering is optional, and doesn't have to run my life. I hope to give back what little I can to the Buddhist community that has so generously given me so much, sincerely former monk John

Most people who try to commit suicide (successful or not) are those who have come to the end of their tether, see no hope for themselves and believe that those around them would be better off without them. It is either a last desperate act calling out for help or a desperate act to end it. Usually it is the end of a long road of deep and profound sadness; failed attempts to get help, a system that stigmatizes rather than support. Crazy is not a word i would use.

Ben , sorry i expressed my self badly we are total on the same page - i have seen first hand the effects you are talking about with a number of friends, family members and clients.

Regardspaul

Paul I've been devestated by several close friends suicides, been suicidal myself in my 20s, and dealt with moderate depression most of my adult life, so far be it from my to belittle depression, or to even fathom quick fix very light weight "anti depressants" like caffeine. Do you realize this Harvard study involved the suicide death of 277 individuals, and they're trying to say caffeine might have kept half of them alive, i know there's a sucker born every minute, but on this one I'm just not buying.

18 years ago I made one of the most important decisions of my life and entered a local Cambodian Buddhist Temple as a temple boy and, for only 3 weeks, an actual Therevada Buddhist monk. I am not a scholar, great meditator, or authority on Buddhism, but Buddhism is something I love from the Bottom of my heart. It has taught me sobriety, morality, peace, and very importantly that my suffering is optional, and doesn't have to run my life. I hope to give back what little I can to the Buddhist community that has so generously given me so much, sincerely former monk John

lyndon taylor wrote:Do you realize this Harvard study involved the suicide death of 277 individuals

No, it did not.

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725

Most people who try to commit suicide (successful or not) are those who have come to the end of their tether, see no hope for themselves and believe that those around them would be better off without them. It is either a last desperate act calling out for help or a desperate act to end it. Usually it is the end of a long road of deep and profound sadness; failed attempts to get help, a system that stigmatizes rather than support. Crazy is not a word i would use.

Ben , sorry i expressed my self badly we are total on the same page - i have seen first hand the effects you are talking about with a number of friends, family members and clients.

Regardspaul

Paul I've been devestated by several close friends suicides, been suicidal myself in my 20s, and dealt with moderate depression most of my adult life, so far be it from my to belittle depression, or to even fathom quick fix very light weight "anti depressants" like caffeine. Do you realize this Harvard study involved the suicide death of 277 individuals, and they're trying to say caffeine might have kept half of them alive, i know there's a sucker born every minute, but on this one I'm just not buying.

The study did not have any interactions with the people who took their own lives - it used the meta data from previous studies and used the tragic deaths of people who had taken their own lives before this study had started. My understanding is that the research is totally ethical in this regard. I hope that in the end some good can come out of the wasted rare opportunity that human life is.

In any discussion you are entitled to your own opinions (and i will respect them) but facts are facts. I have and will continue to read all of your posts, we share some of the same views and where we differ you posts cause me to think and reflect - so thank you.

Thank you for your kind words Dagon, I know I'm being a little obsessive about this, but I have to take anti depressants every day, way way stronger anti depressants than a few cups of coffee, this study is kind of like one that shows St John's wart to reduce suicide risk by 50%, so people don't go to a doctor, don't take the much stronger more effective anti depressants recommended by doctors for suicidal people, and bam, they're dead, because they read some study that said St John's Wort is as effective as pharmaceuticals. remember in this study something like 100 people commited suicide that were drinking a lot of coffee, heaven help us all if severely depressed people start thinking drinking coffee can replace psychiatric treatment. That's why I don't like this study, even if its true that coffee reduces suicide attempts its irresponsible to promote coffee as a medicine, its just not strong enough for anything but the mildest, least dangerous forms of depression. And you're right I was not infering that the study had anything to do with the suicides, they were, I pray, just collecting data on people.

Something equally outrageous and disgusting; "Buddhism can cure your depression, its not something chemically wrong in your brain, its just a defective way of thinking that meditation can correct. You don't need medication, drugs are bad" and bam you have a whole bunch of naive dead new Buddhists on your conscience.

As a long term forums members we need to be especially sensitive to the potentially life threatening needs of posters on this and other forums, Without a Buddhist psychiatrist on the panel, we have the chance to step in and save someones life, or at least propel them in a much more positive direction, medically, this is not theory, your opinion is as good as mine, this can be life or death, and its definetly right or wrong, I so respect Ben in the depression thread for over and over recommending professional help. If someone honestly tells you, i'm not suicidal at all, I'm just a little down, then let the faith healers go at them maybe tea leaves or coffee will do the trick, but when some one cries out in pain for help and you even sense they may be suicidal, we all need to promote getting help from a doctor. I mean if a long term member of the forum posted they were having severe chest pains after meditation, would you tell them to just relax or see a doctor pronto, same goes for any kind of severe mental illness, see a doctor and this is not my opinion, in this case alone, it is fact.

18 years ago I made one of the most important decisions of my life and entered a local Cambodian Buddhist Temple as a temple boy and, for only 3 weeks, an actual Therevada Buddhist monk. I am not a scholar, great meditator, or authority on Buddhism, but Buddhism is something I love from the Bottom of my heart. It has taught me sobriety, morality, peace, and very importantly that my suffering is optional, and doesn't have to run my life. I hope to give back what little I can to the Buddhist community that has so generously given me so much, sincerely former monk John

Lyndon, I don't think anyone is recommending that anyone on anti-depressant medication give it up in favour of drinking coffee.kind regards,

Ben

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725

I don’t know that you are being obsessive; I think that you are speaking from your own experience with compassion and metta for others – nothing wrong there in my book.

I do understand you concerns about not seeking medical help in all acute case and in all moderate to acute chronic cases. The use of alternative or complementary medications is another issue, especially where the medics are not told about it and prescribes ssri meds.

Personally I think that coffee can be a useful complementary treatment – if you have someone you know that is suffering make the time to sit down with them and share a cup of coffee while you listen with empathy and compassion.

I believe that Buddhism can cure your depression BUT – here is something that I stole that said it better than I can,

[quote="reflection because the Dhamma can eliminate all suffering by ending rebirth (including dukkha of bodily pain & of impermanence, aging and death, dukkha in the aggregates/senses). And that's the final goal of the path - to end suffering by ending rebirth, by ending delusion. The goal is not to create some living experience of "no suffering". Beings who became arahant at the moment of death have just as much reached the final goal as those who stayed alive for a while, like the Buddha. That's why the suttas speak so much of ending birth, ending existence, ending consciousness. If an experience of "being free from suffering" (as a living experience) was the final goal, then this goal itself would have been temporary.So in short, "being free from suffering" is not the final goal, but ending suffering is.[/quote]

I was rightfully corrected earlier in the thread because this is what I was think as I typed – what I said sounded like I believed that it provided a “cure” in this life.

Thanks Dogen, well let me add my perspective to your comments on Buddhism as "cure". I am manic Depressive, I have high blood pressure and heart disease(I've already had one heart attack), I have very high chlorestorol, I just recently came down with type two diabetes(non insulin), which I will have the rest of my life if I don't lose a lot of weight, I even have a slight thyroid imbalance as a side effect of one of my other medicines, One of my manic depression medicines also causes depression as a side effect, so I have to take another medicine for depression. In all I take 10-12 different medicines every day, for all of the aforementioned conditions, and believe it or not, I do very well, I'm not plagued by med side effects, I'm very happy, the only really abnormal thing I do is sleep too much, sometimes, or when I'm sleeping "normally" I can get slightly manic, or excited, kind of like I have been the last couple days, so I have to be very careful the manic doesn't progress to less than normal sleep, in which case I have to increase the dose of my Knock out pills to get more sleep.

Enough about medicine, Im on a Buddhist path, grounded in the lay precepts, making effort on the 8fld path, really trying to bring more love and compassion for others into my life, and yes, I believe there is a path in Buddhism, that I am journeying on, that someday, even if its not this lifetime, will bring me to enlightenment,and to experience Nirvana, my goal is to be a Bodhisattva, not a non returner, even if that is not fully talked about in Thervada traditions. anyway the point is, possibly, I have no idea how likely, I may reach enlightenment before I pass on, and if I do, I am under no illusion or even dream that I will not still need to be taking most of this medicine, if not even more as I get older. In other words I don't mix my spirituality with my physical health, I've tried being cured of illness by religion, and it always ends up badly, in the hospital......And I do not believe the medicine I take in any way hinders my spiritual Journey, short of going on a vegan diet and losing 50lbs, its rather unlikely the amount of medicine I take is going to go down, but that's not any problem, it doesn't make me a second class Buddhist puttajhana that will never reach arhatship because I have a treatable mental illness, as one rather annoying poster tried to say in a thread on mental illness about a month ago, my sicknesses, illnesses, and medications don't define who I am, The buddha defines who I am, just another person on the path, a path to a better way of living.

18 years ago I made one of the most important decisions of my life and entered a local Cambodian Buddhist Temple as a temple boy and, for only 3 weeks, an actual Therevada Buddhist monk. I am not a scholar, great meditator, or authority on Buddhism, but Buddhism is something I love from the Bottom of my heart. It has taught me sobriety, morality, peace, and very importantly that my suffering is optional, and doesn't have to run my life. I hope to give back what little I can to the Buddhist community that has so generously given me so much, sincerely former monk John

Thank you Lyndon for the courage to talk about your condition so candidly.

lyndon taylor wrote:And I do not believe the medicine I take in any way hinders my spiritual Journey, short of going on a vegan diet and losing 50lbs, its rather unlikely the amount of medicine I take is going to go down, but that's not any problem, it doesn't make me a second class Buddhist puttajhana that will never reach arhatship because I have a treatable mental illness, as one rather annoying poster tried to say in a thread on mental illness about a month ago, my sicknesses, illnesses, and medications don't define who I am, The buddha defines who I am, just another person on the path, a path to a better way of living.

You are right, neither your condition nor your medication makes you any less a Buddhist.with metta,

Ben

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725

40 years ago, this is the same kind of positive commentary you might have got about cigarettes, caffeine is a stimulant, not that different from low dose crystal meth or ritalin etc. In the very low doses it does not seem to be much of a problem for MOST, drinkers, BUT NOT ALL, some people are acutely sensitive to stimulants and in a very negative way, recommending coffee and caffeine for these people is both irresponsible and wrong.

The arguement that you are better off taking a known drug is the same one that has been used to excess by the tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana industries, As Buddhists we are encouraged to avoid intoxicants, if you still want drink coffee, as even I do myself, there is no reason to encourage others more purely minded to drink stimulants when they don't want to.

18 years ago I made one of the most important decisions of my life and entered a local Cambodian Buddhist Temple as a temple boy and, for only 3 weeks, an actual Therevada Buddhist monk. I am not a scholar, great meditator, or authority on Buddhism, but Buddhism is something I love from the Bottom of my heart. It has taught me sobriety, morality, peace, and very importantly that my suffering is optional, and doesn't have to run my life. I hope to give back what little I can to the Buddhist community that has so generously given me so much, sincerely former monk John

40 years ago, this is the same kind of positive commentary you might have got about cigarettes, caffeine is a stimulant, not that different from low dose crystal meth or ritalin etc. In the very low doses it does not seem to be much of a problem for MOST, drinkers, BUT NOT ALL, some people are acutely sensitive to stimulants and in a very negative way, recommending coffee and caffeine for these people is both irresponsible and wrong.

The arguement that you are better off taking a known drug is the same one that has been used to excess by the tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana industries, As Buddhists we are encouraged to avoid intoxicants, if you still want drink coffee, as even I do myself, there is no reason to encourage others more purely minded to drink stimulants when they don't want to.

I don't think Ven Apicchato was recommending or encouraging others to do anything. Bhante was merely posting a link to an article on the purported health benefits of coffee. The article that Bhante kindly linked is germane to the subject of discussion. As I mentioned earlier, whether coffee should be classified as an intoxicant is not germane to this discussion.kind regards,

Ben

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725

Well it seems like I can't do anything right here, Ben, except keeping drinking coffee!!!

18 years ago I made one of the most important decisions of my life and entered a local Cambodian Buddhist Temple as a temple boy and, for only 3 weeks, an actual Therevada Buddhist monk. I am not a scholar, great meditator, or authority on Buddhism, but Buddhism is something I love from the Bottom of my heart. It has taught me sobriety, morality, peace, and very importantly that my suffering is optional, and doesn't have to run my life. I hope to give back what little I can to the Buddhist community that has so generously given me so much, sincerely former monk John

Ben wrote:Very often excellent research does get funded by vested interests such as pharmaceutical companies - it doesn't necessarily mean that because the research was privately funded that the results are biased.

Hi Ben,Have you read Deadly Monopolies: The Shocking Corporate Takeover of Life Itself--And the Consequences for Your Health and Our Medical Future by Harriet A. Washington; or Overdosed America: The Broken Promise of American Medicine by John Abramnson; or Manufacturing Depression: The Secret History of a Modern Disease by Gary Greenburg; or Selling Sickness: How the World's Biggest Pharmaceutical Companies Are Turning Us All Into Patients by Roy Moynihan and Alan Cassels; or The Truth About the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do About It by Marcia Angell; or The Rise and Fall of Modern Medicine by James Le Fanu?Kindly,dL